


the in-between times

by kogxnes



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Angst, Autistic Character, Dysphoria, Flashbacks, Mentally Ill Character, Mentions of Rape, Nonbinary Character, Other, Past Abuse, Sensory Overload, Suicide mention, breakdowns, its not hardcore angst tho, mentions of abuse, non binary yamaguchi, not much a plot yet but !!!, suicide ideation, theyre in uni, tsukki is autistic btw, yamaguchi is ace
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-11-14
Packaged: 2018-04-17 21:20:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4681868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kogxnes/pseuds/kogxnes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>kei noticed what appeared to be concern on the smallers face and though he couldn't exactly empathize, he thought they were cute and he wasn't exactly one to cause a scene over something so small. he was apathetic towards most things- anything that wasn't video games and cute cashiers he could flirt with and then never see again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. cold coffee

**Author's Note:**

> ahhhh this is my first fic in like 2 years pls dont kill me omg..... but yea this is a concept i rly liked and i love these two gay idiots so i decided to give this a go! 
> 
> (pls leave feedback i need feedback omg)  
> ((also pls excuse my writing style o k))

It started with his emails. There he was, in all of his shitty morning glory- hair messy, glasses on, squinting at the computer as he logged into his fucking emails. Who the fuck actually _checks_ their emails nowadays anyway?

His computer made a noise not dissimilar to the noise Kei himself had made when he'd woken up, and as the page loaded he took a sip of his coffee that had gone cold, before realizing what a mistake that was and instantly spitting it back into the cup. The page had just loaded when there was a knock on his door. He grumbled under his breath about what shitty luck he had and stood up, opening the door. There was a nervous boy- well, not a boy exactly, standing in front of him, fiddling with some clipboard, not even seeming to notice Tsukishima. The taller of the two cleared his throat, bored with the sight of the smallers shaky hands and wanting to know why the fuck he was outside his apartment at nine fucking am. The smaller looked up and smiled, but seemed to instantly go red when they looked at Kei's face. They fumbled with the stupid clipboard again and nudged it towards the seemingly very grumpy boy in front of them.

"I'm sorry, uh, it's early but uh, you got a package and uh? I need you to sign this." The smaller stuttered out, not making eye contact as they handed Tsukishima the clipboard. Kei just looked back at them, a little dumbstruck by the fact that someone so... nervous? had been hired at all for a job like this. He signed the clipboard but didn't hand it back, looking at the flustered person in front of him, who didn't seem to be done talking.  
"I'm not stupid." They said quickly, and Kei nodded.  
"This is my first shift and I was expecting you to be some old lady because I'm only delivering glasses but you're like tall and younger than me and-" They paused, looking for more words that would help them not get fired. "- _please_ don't tell my boss that I'm acting like this?" Kei noticed what appeared to be concern on the smallers face and though he couldn't exactly  _empathize_ , he thought they were cute and he wasn't exactly one to cause a scene over something so small. He was apathetic towards most things- anything that wasn't video games and cute cashiers he could flirt with and then never see again.  
"I won't tell your boss, I doubt he cares anyway. I'm not an old lady." His tone of voice came off a lot harsher than intended, but he was preoccupied with the thought of the new cashier at the deli down the road.  
"Yeah, right, I can see that. Um, can I have the clipboard back please?" They had the package in their hands, waiting to give it to him. Kei paused for a moment before shaking his head, noticing the smallers look of concern increase.  
"Do you have any more things to deliver?" He asked slowly, not sure if he should really be involving himself in someone so uncertain of themselves.  
"U..h. no. This was my last one but I'm not really supposed to take this long at one house..uh. I have to go, this is just my morning job, I? I have uni in an hour." They took the clipboard back. "Uh. Here's your glasses." They handed him the package and left in a rush.

Kei found himself wishing he was better at flirting with the socially anxious.


	2. freckled shoulders

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> they took a shower, wiped the uncomfortable off of their skin- as much as they could in a world that never seemed to  
> accommodate to the in-between-being that tadashi was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> trigger warning for dysphoria in this chapter + suicidal yamaguchi + mentions of past abuse
> 
> PS SORRY IT'S SO SHORT RIP ME

Yamaguchi- the small nervous mailman-but-not-a-man - blushed the whole way home. Tsukishima Kei- the name echoed and they felt  
unsettled, they'd never met him before but the way Tsukishima looked at them made their entire body feel on edge. They felt the way  
prey in the wild must feel when their predators are watching them. They'd never been hunted before, but they imagined that is what it felt like. 

They had uni that day, and by the time they got home they only had 20 minutes to get ready. They'd never been good at getting dressed in the morning- skirts were what they preferred to wear but that came with a set of gender expectations Tadashi was not ready to tackle just yet. 

They took a shower, wiped the uncomfortable off of their skin- as much as they could in a world that never seemed to accommodate to the in-between-being that Tadashi was.  
They wiped off the 'he's', and the 'sirs', and the way Kei's eyes had felt on their shoulders.  
They hated the way every stranger scanned their body, looking for some gendered thing, looking for aspects Tadashi did not have, would never have, could never have.  
Looking for a bump in their chest, or facial hair, makeup, jewelry, anything that would justify them putting Tadashi in a tiny box that they could not breath in. They didn't like to focus on it, didn't make eye contact with people on the street, only gave coffee shops their first names, not caring about the informality's or impracticalities of it all,  
just wanted to feel validated. 

The soap seemed to get rid of everything, they stepped out of the shower and looked in the mirror. They couldn't remember a time where they had looked in the mirror and not wanted to kill themselves. They weren't covered in bruises any more, their freckles were the only thing that covered their chest and shoulders, but the way some people looked at them sometimes made them wish it'd been a punch, instead.


	3. pretty/sour taste

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "i think there’s a fault in my code,  
> these voices won’t leave me alone.  
> well my heart is gold, and my hands are cold,"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yamaguchi gets misgendered a lot and tsukki is a NERD who stims a lot
> 
> trigger warning for ;  
> -dysphoria  
> -transmisogyny  
> -misgendering  
> -f slur  
> -t slur  
> -tsukki stims a lot n chews things n yamaguchi notices  
> -tsukki has a meltdown soRry

After they had showered, Yamaguchi found themselves putting on stockings and a dress that they'd bought a year ago. They stood in front of the mirror and smiled to themselves. They felt... pretty? _Pretty._ They smiled more. Pretty. Not ugly anymore, not a freak or a faggot. They were pretty. 

\-------------------------------

The small, 2 syllable word echoed in their head on the walk to the bus stop. It was shallow, and pathetic, but they were so sick of being the weird kid, the lonely kid, the homeless kid. This was a new form of name-calling, the good kind, the kind that made them stand up a little straighter, walk a little faster, smile at strangers. They briefly wondered if it was normal to get so caught up on any sense of a good feeling, but the good things happened so rarely that Tadashi couldn't help but chase it.

As they sat down at the bus stop, a short, middle aged man looked at them. They smiled at them, usually they would shrink in their seats and pray that the bus would arrive early, but today they were  _pretty._  They smiled at him, but a sharp feeling shot through them as the man stepped toward them. 

"Are you a girl?" The man asked, and Yamaguchi felt their cheeks burn up. They were used to confused glances, even stares, when people weren't subtle, but they had never been asked so blatantly by a  _stranger._

"I-I.. No?" They shook their head, deciding it was a good opportunity to educate somebody. 

"Then what the fuck are you." He spat at them, drops of spit making their way from his mouth onto their dress, and they couldn't help but be terrified. This man seemed so  _angry_   with them, all they had been doing was waiting for the bus, they hadn't done anything wrong but with the way this man was looking at them you'd think they'd killed his family. 

"I-I'm neither, I-I'm genderless, I.." They spoke with surprising conviction, their voice not wavering as much as they'd expected. If you had been an eavesdropper who could not see their cheeks burning and their eyes filling with tears, you would have believed that they were confident and strong. 

"You're a boy in a dress, is what you are. A faggot and a queer. You think you can trick people into believing you're not just a faggot? You're wrong. I see right through you." He raised his voice a little, and Yamaguchi shrunk even more, hunching their shoulders over and hanging their head, their hair covering it as they started to cry. 

"Pathetic." He said sharply, and spat properly this time, spit landing on Yamaguchi's shoes. The man walked off, and left a sobbing Yamaguchi. 

\---------------------------------------------------

They took a deep breath, hands shaky and they looked up as their bus arrived, five minutes after the man had left. They didn't know whether they were relieved or annoyed at it's arrival, but either way they had a class to get to. They stood up, legs shaky and got on. They fumbled with their change and bought a ticket, going and sitting at the back of the bus.

Once they had stopped shaking they looked up, trying to see if they knew anyone on the bus. They didn't usually like to talk to people from their uni, but today they were feeling very vulnerable and hoped they'd have someone to walk to class with.

They noticed someone near the front that they recognized, though they couldn't pinpoint where from. Their head was fuzzy from crying and the incident so they just figured it was someone from uni. They recognized most people from their class, and had briefly introduced themselves at the beginning of the semester, so it surely wouldn't be unusual to go and sit next to them, right? He certainly didn't look like an intimidating guy- he had those big headphones that were usually only worn by 10 year old boys, and he had those  _stupid_ glasses that Tadashi had definitely seen before. 

They got up and sat next to him, smiling a little as the man looked over them. He looked over their face, and his eyes seemed to stop at their shoulders, and Tadashi was filled with a familiar sense of discomfort. The pieces clicked together, like puzzle pieces, right in front of them and they realized  _this is the fucking asshole who they embarrassed themselves in front of this morning._ As the man took off his headphones, Yamaguchi instantly started apologising, the space between them being filled with  _'oh my god I'm so sorry I thought you were someone else', 'I swear to god I'm not stalking you,_ and  _'I'm sorry's,_ the words overlapping, the different sentences being interrupted by more apologies and they barely noticed the man staring dumbfounded at them. 

"You're my mailman." He said eventually, once Yamaguchi had been able to calm down enough to shut the fuck up for two seconds. 

"I'm not a man." They said quickly, not wanting him to start making assumptions about them. They hated the thought of him thinking they were a boy. 

"Okay? The parcel deliverer. The mailperson. The person who delivered my old lady glasses. The cute one who blushed for no reason and was apparently too busy to spend time with me." He replied, smirking a little to himself. He seemed to smirk more when he noticed Yamaguchi go red again. 

"Th-The..cute one?" They looked at him. They couldn't believe this fucking nerd had the  _nerve_ to call them cute. What a loser. What a fucking dork. 

"You're all freckly and nervous and small and you had that stupid hat on like a fucking dork." 

Yamaguchi couldn't believe this. They were being called a dork by someone in a fucking  _Jurassic Park_ t shirt. They were gonna kick this guys fucking ass. 

"You're wearing white boy headphones and a t shirt from the kids sale rack." They blurted out quickly, but it was less of a burn and more of a nervous rushed sentence. The man didn't seem to mind at all that they sounded nervous. 

"Oh, now you're deciding to get cocky on me? After you moved to sit next to me? I'll fight you." He was smirking, and Yamaguchi grinned back at him. 

"That was before I knew you had an actual dinosaur on your t shirt. Are you twelve?" 

"Fuck you! Dinosaurs are beautiful animals." 

"Were." They corrected him. 

"Is that a threat?" He tilted his head a little and pushed up his glasses. 

\-------------------------------------

They were like that the entire bus ride, making fun of each other and being mean, but Yamaguchi  _loved it._ They had never met someone who could so easily communicate with them- this guy seemed to have an answer to everything, and it was always cutting and sharp and  _fucking amazing._

"I don't know your name." The man said after awhile, looking at them.

"Oh. Right." Their stomach filled with nerves for no particular reason. "Tadashi Yamaguchi, um. You don't have to call me by my full name, though. Obviously. That'd be stupid." They rambled. 

"Kei Tsukishima." He smiled at them, and it wasn't condescending or a smirk, it was genuine, and it seemed to ease all of the bad feelings that sat in the pit of Tadashi's tummy. 

"Where are you going?" Yamaguchi asked, not really acknowledging the exchange of their names, too curious about where Kei was headed.

"I have a uni class. Haven't been all semester. Figured I should probably try to not be a complete failure and actually try to do well." He shrugged. 

That made Yamaguchi's stomach sink a little and left a sour taste in their mouth. They didn't like that Kei felt that way about himself. They barely knew him but they cared about him and they didn't want him to feel like a failure.

"Hey, uh, no. You're not a failure. I used to skip all the time! Sometimes stuff is really hard and you don't really... you can't get motivated for class. It's understandable!" They smiled, trying to sound convincing. 

Tsukishima nodded but mumbled something under his breath that Yamaguchi didn't quite catch. 

After a few minutes of silence, Yamaguchi asked what class Tsukishima had, and it turned out they were in the same class, which Yamaguchi was very happy about. 

\-------------------------------------------------

It was a fairly usual class, except this time Yamaguchi actually had company, which was nice. They were starting to get used to Tsukishima's company, although they noticed about halfway through class that Tsukishima also had earphones with him and always seemed to have at least one in, and that he had a little necklace with a little rubber shape on the end that he chewed on a lot. They were confused and didn't really understand a lot of the things Tsukishima did, but they didn't mind. He was good company, he made them feel less lonely, so they didn't really mind that he acted a little unusually. 

After class, the two of them were walking outside, and Yamaguchi was about to ask Kei if he wanted to get lunch with them, when they were approached by a boy who was in their class. They'd never spoken to him before, besides a quick introduction at the beginning of the semester. Besides that, this guy was basically a stranger. They were a little confused, but they gave a nervous smile. 

"Hi," He smiled. 

"Hey uh.. Do I.. Know you?" They were coming across as a little rude but they really just wanted to spend more time with Tsukishima, without anybody else interrupting. They had so much left to ask him. 

"No, but we've been in the same class for like a month and I uh?" He paused, fidgeting on his feet for a moment. He looked nervous and Yamaguchi's stomach twisted a little, not knowing what was coming next. 

"I really think I like you? Like, you're really cute and you seem like a really nice girl and..." He carried on talking but they weren't listening, tuning it out and shaking their head. The word  _girl_ played over and over and they wanted to disappear from the situation. They didn't want to explain the ins and outs of their gender to this  _stranger_ who didn't know them at all. Their hands started shaking, like they always did when things like this happened and when they finally tuned back into the world, both Tsukishima and the stranger were looking at him. 

"No, no, no, no." They raised their voice a little, and if they weren't so caught up in their own emotions they would have noticed Tsukishima visibly flinching and shutting his eyes. 

"I'm not a girl." They said, their voice resting at the louder pitch and Tsukishima stepped back a little. 

"You look like one? What are you, then," He looked a little confused and very offended. 

"I'm genderless, I'm nothing, neither, none of them." They rambled, their hands starting to shake more.

"That's bullshit, that's not a thing. It's one or the other, and you're definitely a girl," His tone was pointed and offended and _loud_  and Yamaguchi's heartbeat was loud in their ears as they shook their head. 

"It's not that simple, though! I'm not a girl!" They were getting more and more worked up, the misgendering getting to them and they needed him to know that they weren't a girl in any sense of the word, they weren't going to be put into that box just because it was easier for some stranger to swallow than having to respect their gender.

As the two of them argued, Tsukishima got more and more overwhelmed. His hands were shaking too, his head feeling heavy and he knew he had to leave and get out but he didn't wanted to leave Yamaguchi by themself with an asshole.   
The yelling physically hurt, every sentence was like being shot in the head and  _holy shit he had to get out._

He walked off, finding a bathroom and locking himself in a stall. Every noise and every colour, the smell of the toilets and the sound of people shuffling around, all of it was repetitive and too much and he sat on the floor in the tiny stall- the floor cold. He covered his ears- his fingers covered in blood from subconsciously picking at his fingers and he cried a little as he tried his hardest to ignore it all. But he couldn't, and his music wouldn't help when he was like this. None of his stims would calm him down. There was nothing he could do but cry and wait for it to pass, wait for it to be over and wait for everything to  _stop._


	4. plastic dinosaurs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tsukki has a pretty girl/boy/yamaguchi over and his brother will probably never stop making fun of him. 
> 
> aka yamaguchi meets the family (the family being the small collection of toy dinosaurs on tsukkis bedside table)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> suga is in this chapter! i figured if anyones gonna stand up 2 bigots it's gonna b that cinnamon roll

It's ten minutes before Yamaguchi finally finds Tsukishima. They knock on the stall door.

"Tsukki? Are you in there? I'm sorry about before. I should've just walked away. I'm just having a weird day and I didn't even think about the fact that it might make you uncomfortable." They were rambling again. Tsukishima was calm now. Now he was just thinking about why Yamaguchi always rambled when they were nervous.

"It's fine, stop talking," He finally says, cutting off Yamaguchi. It came out a little harsher than he intended, probably because he'd been crying for the past ten minutes.

"O-Oh, right, yeah, sorry. I ramble a lot. Sorry," Yamaguchi sounds even more nervous now, and Tsukishima wants to punch himself for being such an asshole.

"No, it's fine. I didn't mean it in a mean way," He stood up and walked out of the stall. He looked at Yamaguchi, trying to subtly check if everything was okay. But he's never been very good at identifying feelings, and Yamaguchi, a new person, posed a whole different set of challenges. They seemed to always have some degree of worry etched into their face- it was hard to tell what their normal expression was and what they looked like when they were upset.

"U-Uh, are you feeling any better?" They were playing with their hands.

"Yeah, a lot better. I'm sorry for leaving you with him, but I probably wouldn't have been much use staying in that situation the way I was, so," He walked past Yamaguchi to the sinks, looking in the mirror and fixing his hair. It was messy from him pulling at it while he'd been crying.

"Oh, no it's okay! He left after awhile, this really nice person came and stood up to him, ah, it was great," They smiled.

Tsukishima nodded and left the bathroom, hearing Yamaguchi's uncertain footsteps follow him.

"A-Ah, what was that, though? Was it just like, a panic attack? Because I get those too sometimes but I just wanna know what triggered it so I ca-" Tsukishima cut them off.

"I don't want to talk about this," He said firmly, because in all honesty, it embarrassed him. He wasn't the kind of person to let much get to him, but his autism was a sensitive spot and he definitely didn't want Yamaguchi, this new, incredible person, to know about it. 

"O-Oh, okay. Sorry, Tsukki." 

Tsukishima nods, and he doesn't think he's ever liked his name as much as he does right in this moment. 

They both walk to a little cafe and have lunch together. Tsukki laughs for the first time in weeks, it feels like, and he can't help but memorize the way Yamaguchi's face looks in the light, the sun cascading down their shoulders and hitting their freckles and Tsukki finds it difficult to believe that they are not the sun lighting up the room, because whenever they laugh it feels like everything gets a little brighter.

Eventually, after a lot of coffee and muffins, Tsukishima decides to pull his head out of his ass and ask Yamaguchi to come over. On the bus ride back to his house he is praying to everything he believes in that Akiteru won't be home when he gets back. If he comes home with a cute person after telling his brother for years and years that he's not interested in dating, he'll never hear the end of it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im not sure how many chapters this is going to have because this is the only ongoing fic i have that is well-written and has an actual plotline and that i'm actually,,, planning to go on for awhile and have character development and stuff. i dont wanna make it have too many chapters? but i also don't want to make the chapters too long because i know that i get bored with super long chapters but like, if you guys would prefer longer chapters and less chapters rather than short chapters and more of them just. let me kno what u'd prefer bc im happy to do whatever!!
> 
> ALSO SORRY FOR TAKING SO LONG TO UPDATE I HAD EXAMS THEN CHRISTMAS THEN MENTAL HEALTH STUFF ;_; im sorry tho i will try 2 update more. i forgot how much i love this fic,,


End file.
